


Running On

by GinnyBloomPotter



Category: The Magicians (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Angst, Angst and Hurt/Comfort, Character Death Fix, Depression, Episode: s04e13 No Better To Be Safe Than Sorry, Exhaustion, Hurt/Comfort, M/M, Nightmares, Peaches and Plums (The Magicians), Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder - PTSD, Quentin Coldwater Lives, Quentin Coldwater-centric, Recovery, Suicidal Thoughts, Whump, episode rewrite
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-01-31
Updated: 2020-05-08
Packaged: 2021-02-27 11:02:13
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 10
Words: 14,457
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22486033
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/GinnyBloomPotter/pseuds/GinnyBloomPotter
Summary: Quentin had got so used to wanting to die, he supposed he didn't realize how bad it had gotten until it was almost too late.ORAuthor refuses to watch season 5 until she knows Quentin comes back, and until then, will fix the end of season 4.ORThe whole problem could've been avoided if they hadn't spent so much time staring at the Seam instead of throwing the bottles into it.
Relationships: Margo Hanson & Eliot Waugh, Quentin Coldwater & Alice Quinn, Quentin Coldwater & Josh Hoberman, Quentin Coldwater & Julia Wicker, Quentin Coldwater & Kady Orloff-Diaz, Quentin Coldwater & Margo Hanson, Quentin Coldwater/Eliot Waugh, William "Penny" Adiyodi & Quentin Coldwater
Comments: 62
Kudos: 299





	1. Empty

**Author's Note:**

> Another fix it fic because we need more of them goddammit. I'm hoping this will fill all of our needs for Quentin getting some goddamn appreciation. 
> 
> MAJOR TRIGGER WARNING FOR DEPRESSION AND SUICIDAL THOUGHTS.  
> Quentin's experience with depression is based partially off of my own, and the way I handle certain things, combined with things that I know have happened canonically, so I've tried to make it as realistic as possible, but it might not align with certain ways other people have seen and/or experienced depression. 
> 
> Also contains canon-compliant cussing. Just a warning. They drop the F bomb on the show, so I don't feel bad about putting them in here.
> 
> Hope you enjoy!

He’d spent so many years convinced he wanted to die.

He knew he shouldn’t want to. He knew that, and he  _ tried  _ to not want to, tried for years, going in and out of therapy and psychiatric facilities and going on and off of meds and burying himself in books like he could fix his brain if he pretended not to be him anymore, and none of it fucking  _ worked. _ He had fucking magic in his life and he still just wanted to  _ die. _

Things got a little bit better for some time, he had to admit. His brain was half okay when he was around his friends. Eliot and Julia and Margo were the best, and Alice if he was speaking to her that day, and Josh when he remembered he existed, and Kady when she was around, and even fucking Penny who hated his guts most of the time. 

But then Alice died. Then he went nuts trying to get her back. Then he got magic turned off. Then he had to try and get magic turned back on. Then they were forced into being different people and he woke up only to discover that Eliot wasn’t Eliot anymore. 

It was all so soul crushing. If he was honest, he’d been actively declining with no hope of return since that boat trip he took, since he watched Benedict throw himself off the side of the ship… or maybe it was when Eliot rejected him. But if he really thought about it, it must have been Benedict. He didn’t know if he’d really smiled since Benedict. 

And he barely even  _ knew  _ Benedict. He was fucked up over the death of a person he hardly knew. Okay, so he was sweet and kind and good-hearted and his death was maybe just a little bit Quentin’s fault but-- Actually, no. No buts. He was right to be fucked up over it. 

It just sucked that he hadn’t really had a moment to process everything. Except when he was Brian. But not really then, actually, because it wasn’t like he could remember anything that had happened, so how could he really process it? 

So yeah. He’d felt fucked up for a while.

And then things just got worse. Eliot was… wasn’t  _ Eliot _ anymore. And he was so ready to just give up on it all. Kill the monster, kill himself, get out of this nightmarish world where he’d lost his… not  _ best  _ friend because that was Julia, but god, friend was just not a word that could actually describe his relationship with the man he’d spent 50 years essentially married to…

But then Eliot broke through.

_ Peaches and plums, motherfucker. _

He didn’t know what to do. He didn’t know how to save him. He didn’t even know that he could. 

But god, he at least had to  _ try. _

And okay, so maybe he got slightly obsessive. Maybe it wasn’t the healthiest thing in the world. But since when had he been the healthiest person?

Besides, if he was getting too bad someone would notice, right? Julia was around a bunch, and yeah, she was kind of wrapped up in her own shit but she’d… she would’ve been paying enough attention to notice enough right? No one had said anything, so he took that as permission to keep going. 

He was just so  _ tired _ now. He supposed the true sign that maybe he’d gone too far off the deep end was when they succeeded and… nothing. Nothing changed, nothing happened, he didn’t feel any relief…

He  _ heard  _ Eliot speak. He saw Margo try frantically to keep him awake and talking, he knew she was calling angrily for Penny to get them to a damn hospital, and still, he couldn’t bring himself to care. He just wanted a nap. 

The only reason he went with them to the hospital was Penny grabbing hold of his arm and pulling him over. 

He watched Eliot get wheeled into the back with nothing but a faint sense of dread. He watched Margo sob helplessly in a corner and he… he didn’t know what to do. Numb, he collapsed into a chair in the waiting room. Next thing he knew, he had a shoulder full of the former High King of Fillory, who decided his shirt sleeve would make a good tear-absorber. And he tried to be supportive-- really, he did. But what else could he do but wrap his arm around his shaking friend and close his eyes.

He really just wanted to go home. 

Penny and Alice came by to grab him and bring him to the mirror world. He barely reacted, just standing and leaving Margo with a quiet apology, and grabbing hold of Penny’s shoulder so he could travel along. 

Alice and Penny seemed to be moving at a glacial pace. Frustrated and tired, he refused to abide by it for long, prodding Alice to keep moving and opening the door to the Seam when she wouldn’t. He made a beeline for the cloth covered structure in the middle of the room and didn’t waste time looking. He just chucked the first bottle straight into the mirror. Alice was shaking nervously, giving him concerned looks, and even Penny was seeming confused by his quick, matter-of-fact behavior, but he didn’t have the energy to care. He took the other bottle from Alice and threw that one straight in as well. 

He turned around to face his companions, eyes dead. Could they go, he wondered aloud, and after an exchanged look, they both nodded. 

They bumped into Everett on the way out of the room. It took only seconds for the man to register their bottle-less hands, and an angry fire grew behind his eyes. 

“You--”

Quentin didn’t bother waiting for a response. Unmoved, he brushed past the man swiftly, and made his way to the exit. There was a commotion behind him, but he couldn’t be troubled to turn around. 

He left the mirror dimension. Penny and Alice came running out behind him not seconds later. They could see Everett making a dive to go through as well, but thinking quickly, Penny closed the portal before more than a hand made it through.

Severed, the hand fell to the floor, and Quentin could vaguely hear Alice yelling at Penny about Everett, who was probably dead now. 

Like Eliot.

Dimly, he felt himself fall to the floor, just staring at the hand on the ground. It… it was over, wasn’t it? The monster, the monster’s sister… they were gone. They’d done it. But did they save Eliot, Quentin wondered? Was it worth it? Was Eliot alive?

He’d go find out. He’d go to the hospital and not move from his bedside until he woke up because it wasn’t  _ fair.  _ He couldn’t have put in that much work only for Eliot to die anyway. He’d go. He would.

Just as soon as he could find the energy to stand up. 

An empty feeling gnawed at his stomach, and he faintly realized that he must be hungry, starving, actually, because he couldn’t remember the last time he ate. His mouth was dry and cottony as well, so he was probably thirsty too. And his face was… cold. Hot, then cold, and he lifted his hand one of the spots where the strange sensation was occurring and felt… wet? He was… was he bleeding? No, there was no redness on his finger when he drew his hand away. 

Something caught in his throat, his breath, and he heard the sobs before he realized he was producing them. 

He looked up through his tears at Alice and Penny, who were so wrapped up in their argument that they didn’t even seem to realize he was crying. 

With strength he didn’t know he had, Quentin stood. On shaky legs, he wobbled his way out the door and tried to find his way to the hospital. 

God, he was so  _ tired. _

He took a long blink as he stumbled, and when he opened his eyes, he was tripping his way through the door of the lobby. He lay on the floor for a moment, tempted to sleep, but then a warm hand wrapped around his arm and pulled him up. 

Margo. It was Margo, and her tearstained face looked imploringly at his own. She asked what happened. If it worked. If it was over. 

“Yes…” he croaked out. Just barely croaked out. 

And then Margo was hugging him and he just… when was the last time someone had touched him without necessity or harmful intent? When had he last been hugged? 

He shook and trembled in Margo’s arms, and she pushed him to sit-- when had they made it to a chair?-- and then she pulled his head down, into her lap, and her hand stroked through his hair, and he couldn’t remember saying anything to her, but she was murmuring words of assurance to him, asking him if he’d slept at all in the last couple of days, telling him Eliot was in surgery but a nurse had come out and told her he was pulling through okay, and he didn’t know when he’d fallen asleep, only that he was suddenly okay, and sitting at Eliot’s bedside.

Eliot was awake. He was awake and looking at him, and he started speaking, but the words that left his mouth weren’t his, they were the monster’s, and there was another Eliot laying dead on the floor, and Julia was behind him, hair messy and eyeliner smudged, and she wasn’t Julia, she was the sister and they’d  _ failed, failed, failed, failed…  _ And then the Monster’s hand was around his throat and he hoped,hoped, hoped that he could just  _ die _ already…

His eyes closed…

When they opened, he found himself cowering in a corner of the, mercifully, mostly empty lobby. He was shaking and sweating and his throat was aching in a way that made him think he must have been screaming, and both Margo and Julia were crouched in front of him, hands held out placatingly, and Penny and Alice and Kady hovered behind them, and all of them looked very freaked out and just slightly worried except Julia, who, he supposed, had enough experience with him post nightmare that she knew what to expect. 

He got his bearings and unclenched his tense hands that were gripping tightly to the roots of his hair. He took a deep breath and held a shaky hand out to Julia, who used it to help him up. 

Her hands were cold, he noticed as he stood, and it was a welcome sensation when she lay a palm against his cheek, hot with sleep. A slim thumb swiped at his cheeks. She offered a tremulous smile. He did not return it. 

He felt hollow. Like someone had scooped out anything inside him that could come close to resembling anything human, and left nothing but emptiness and fear instead. 

HIs chest and his torso ached.

He collapsed into a chair and let his head fall back against the wall. He heard concerned murmurs coming from his friends but he couldn’t bring himself to care. He muttered to them that he was fine. Just wanted to go back to sleep. 

It was the only thing he had the energy to bring himself to do. 


	2. Fumes

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Conversations happen. Not particularly good ones.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'm rushing to get this up before I have to turn off my computer, so I'm sorry if it's a little rushed.

Kady wordlessly pressed a bottle of water and a vending machine sandwich into his hands when he woke up. She was sitting next to him, stoic and silent and she didn’t even look at him. The waiting room was empty apart from the two of them.

They were silent for a minute longer, and then Kady cleared her throat. 

“Eliot’s out of surgery. He hasn’t woken yet, as far as I know, but it shouldn’t be long now.”

He nodded in acknowledgment. “And the others?” 

“Margo’s in the recovery room with Eliot. 23 went to Fillory to find Fen and Josh, to keep them informed. Alice’s friend from the library came by to have a chat with her. I don’t know where they went. Julia… well, she’s asleep,” she gave a little half smile. “Back at the apartment. Still recovering, I think.”

He nodded again. He looked down at his hands. The water bottle was cold, and the side bore the name of a small brand he’d only ever seen in Brakebills. The sandwich was an unappealing looking plain turkey on white bread, and the thought of eating it both made him hungrier and made him feel slightly sick. 

“You don’t have to eat it,” Kady mentioned, “but you probably should. I could hear your stomach growling as you slept.”

He hummed an acceptance, but didn’t move to open the package. It would require too many steps and too many hands, and Kady didn’t really seem like she wanted to be there, let alone help him. 

And yet, she wordlessly took the water bottle from him and cracked it open, then handed it back and told him to drink. As he complied, she took the sandwich and opened the plastic container as well, then took out a half and gave it to him while she took the other half for herself. She didn’t look at him while she bit into it, and after watching her carefully for a second, he took a bite as well. 

It tasted of nothing, and neither the turkey nor the bread was a great texture, but he finished it anyway, then polished off the water too. It probably hadn’t been enough, not nutritionally, and not even to fill his empty, still growling stomach, but it was something, and he didn’t want to try and eat anything else. Not when it took so much energy to get even that much down. 

They were quiet for another few minutes. Part of him didn’t mind, neither willing, nor having the energy to keep up a conversation. The air got aggressively awkward faster than Quentin could figure out how to fill the silence though, and a not insignificant portion of him wanted to shout just to break up the quiet. 

Kady turned to him abruptly. “So are you okay?” she asked, and he stared blankly back at her. 

“What? Yea-”

“Don’t bullshit me, Quentin.”

“Why’d you ask if you think you already know the answer?”

She huffed a humorless laugh. “Hell if I know,” she muttered as she turned forward in her seat again. “But seriously though, dude. What the fuck is going on with you?”

He hunched his shoulders. What kind of answer did she think she was going to get exactly? What made her think he’d just… spill his guts like that. As far as he knew, it wasn’t like she’d really give a crap.

When he didn’t answer, she sighed. “If you thought I wouldn’t take silence as any kind of answer, you’d be wrong.”

“I just--” he finally started, then stopped. Words were hard when he got like this. “I don’t.... I don’t know what you want from me--”

“An answer would be nice.” When he was quiet yet again, she continued. “A blind man would notice that something’s up, Quentin. And I’m neither. I know I’ve never really been all that… I don’t know, caring or soft or whatever bullshit in the past, but… I mean, none of us want to see you destroy yourself. Not even 23, and he’s a bigger asshole than our Penny was.”

“You sure you don’t just think that because of--”

“Don’t start that shit. Just don’t. You’re being an asshole to get me to back off and it’s not worth it so just stop.”

“How would you--”

“Kettle, meet pot.”

And boy did that just make zero sense. Or maybe he was just too tired to try and puzzle it out.

“You’re a mess, dude,” she went on, “and you’re gonna kill yourself if you keep going on like this.”

Quentin’s breath hitched in his throat in a cheap mockery of a scoff. He couldn’t help but think to himself that the idea didn’t sound too bad. 

“Well you picked an interesting time to start caring,” he said instead. 

“Yeah, well, forgive me for deciding I don’t want to watch you self destruct.”

“You’re a little late for that,” he muttered. 

“Not while you’re still alive, I’m not,” she stood and smirked at him, “and from what I can tell, you are.”

She walked away. Quentin didn’t bother to watch her leave. 

If he was honest, he resented her for acting like handing him half a sandwich and a bottle of water would start making a difference. He resented her for living in an apartment with him for the last few months and not noticing that he’s been self destructing. For not noticing that or realizing how much being around the monster while he was in Eliot’s body would hurt him. 

And if he was really honest, he’d admit that he didn’t expect her to care. He never had. But she was acting like she cared now, and that felt kind of like a slap in the face. More than that, there were people that he  _ had  _ expected to care. Julia, at the very least, who hadn’t seemed to see anything, and Margo, who he was shocked to find he was disappointed with. Somehow, without realizing it, he’d come to believe and trust that she cared. And then she fucked off to Fillory and left him alone with the Monster. 

He hadn’t remembered getting to this point. He hadn’t expected it to go so far, to get so tired, to get so… he trusted them! And he resented himself for trusting them, for trusting his friends to pull him out, but wasn’t that what you were meant to do? Rely on your friends to pull your head out of your ass? And he had and they’d failed him and he was so… 

He’d been so tired for so long, he was shocked to find that he suddenly wasn’t quite as numb as he had been just a few hours ago. So maybe the nap had done him some good. And yet, he still felt he had a long way to go. 

* * *

The closer to waking that Eliot got, the more pain he found himself in. Which was irritating, because he hasn’t anticipated his first experience with post-Monster existence being painful. He’d hoped there would have been some tearful reunions, actually, where he could’ve been brave and confessed his feelings to Quentin and he could’ve given Margo a great big hug and-- honestly, he knew none of that would’ve happened, but it had still been an expectation of his. 

His eyes opened. There was Bambi, sitting at his bedside, half asleep. She jolted into full wakefulness when a groan escaped him. 

“El!” His best friend had never been one for big emotional displays, but that didn’t stop her from one at that moment. The only thing that had stopped her jumping on him had been him flinching away as she prepared to pounce. 

“Sorry, Bambi, but I’m not sure my guts in any shape for close embraces right now.”

She smirked and leaned back. “Sorry. How are you feeling?”

“Oh, you know. Perfectly peachy.”

Her nose crinkled at his phrasing. He half shrugged in response. “How do you think I feel?”

She conceded to that point. 

“So how did you…?”

“Defeat the beast?” Margo finished when it became clear that he couldn’t. “A little ax grinding. A little seam throwing. Incorporate bonds on bottles…”

She explained the whole story, and Eliot didn’t quite know how to handle it. 

“I’m so sorry, Bambi.”

“You should be. Leaving me alone like that. I got myself dethroned for you, you bastard.”

He felt bad about that he really did. But--

“Quentin’s okay, though,” he said. “Isn’t he? It makes it worth it. At least he’s not…”

“What? Stuck in Blackspire? That might have been kinder, El.”

“Kinder? Kinder than what?

Margo was studiously silent.

“Kinder than what, Margo?”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'll hopefully expand on everything in the next chapter. I hope you enjoyed this one. I wanted to see Kady and Quentin interact, because I feel like we don't get a lot of that. 
> 
> Please please let me know what you thought. I'd love to know.


	3. Memories

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Quentin's really done. What else is new?

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I wasn't going to upload this now and then I realized that I'd hit a good stopping point and it was a decent length. I'm sorry it's took a bit to upload. I hope you enjoy it!

Quentin glanced up at the sound of footsteps. Margo took a few uncharacteristically cautious steps into the waiting room. When she saw his open eyes looking right at her, she brightened considerably, and made her way over to sit beside him. 

“You’re awake,” she noted as she sat, and he shrugged.

“How’s Eliot?” he asked instead of answering.

“Also awake. There’s a nurse in there, feeling him up right now.”

“Do you mean checking his vitals and his wound?”

She shrugged with a smirk. “Seemed pretty kinky to me.”

Quentin almost laughed. 

“He was asking about you,” she told him. His heart felt just a drop lighter at that. 

“Really?”

“Yeah. Asked if you were okay,” she said it kind of weirdly, but he couldn’t quite put his finger on what it was that confused him. 

He wasn’t sure how to reply. “O-- O--okay?”

“Yeah. Okay. And let me tell you, that was a pretty hard question to answer.”

“But-- but I am. I mean, I’m… I'm fine, I’m breathing. I don’t need any medical attention or--”

“That does not mean you are ‘fine,’ Quentin. In no way does that make you fine.”

And now he was feeling kind of like she was about to give him a lecture similar to the one he’d gotten from Kady. 

“Don’t,” he warned. “Kady just gave--”

“Well, fuck it Q, you need to be lectured,” she interrupted. “You need to start taking care of yourself because--”

“I mean it. Don’t.” Fuck, he was tired. And pissed. Who the fuck did she think she was anyway? “You don’t get to fuck off to Fillory and then come back and act like I’ve committed some… some heinous grievance by letting myself go a little bit. You don’t know, Margo. You weren’t here, so you don’t know how it-- how  _ he _ … I woke up every morning and the Monster was standing there, staring at me with Eliot’s eyes and wanting to  _ play  _ with me and all of his games involved killing other people or trying to destroy Eliot’s body or hurting me or-- you can’t be mad at me for falling apart when day in and day out all I knew, all I had… I got bad and you weren’t there so you can’t be mad at me now for--”

He was talking cyclically, chasing streams of logic that never seemed to come together. He couldn’t fully put how angry he was into words. That wasn’t new, the inability to fully form words or full sentences or ideas and it was made even worse when he was worked up the way he was. 

He stopped for a minute, breathing hard, ignoring the look on Margo’s face, the one that looked like she felt like she’d been slapped, and then ignoring the righteous indignation that took its place.

“You--” she started. He didn’t let her finish.

“I know it was hard for you. I’m not… I’m not blaming you for leaving. I mean, I am, but it’s not fair of me and I know that. I’m upset that you’ve come back now and have the audacity to act like I did something horribly wrong. I’m upset with you, I’m not thrilled with Kady either and I’m just…”

He wasn’t sure he wanted to start spilling his guts, but the floodgates had opened, and he wasn’t quite sure he had a choice anymore. 

“I’m not good at figuring out when I’m getting bad until I’m there. I didn’t… I’m so used to part of me wanting to die that I didn’t know how serious it had gotten until the Monster-fighting was over and I had a second to feel relieved and I  _ couldn’t. _ And I thought that that was what my friends were supposed to do-- I thought I could rely on people-- Julia  _ especially _ \-- to help me figure out when I was running myself into the ground and give me a hand in pulling myself back up. I trusted that it would happen. And, okay, lesson learned, turns out I can’t put my faith in things like that. But you don’t get to come back to me now and act like… act all mad like this. People didn’t care then? Fine. They had their own shit to deal with? Whatever. I get it. But you can’t… no one gets to act like they care now. It’s too late to start caring now. Thanks for telling me to watch out for hole, Margo, but a lot of good that warning’s gonna do when I’m already stuck in it.”

He stood then, having said his piece, and not really caring if Margo got to say hers. He left her behind, making his way to the hallway of patient rooms she had come from. It occurred to him as he left that he had no idea which one Eliot was in. The thought of turning around and trying to find out felt wrong, though, and so he kept walking. He’d find it. Even if he had to look into every single room in this goddamn hospital, he’d find it. 

As it happened, he didn’t need to look into every room. Just five. 

He thought it would be strange to see him again. He thought, somewhere, in the back of his mind, that he’d still see the Monster when he looked at Eliot, that he’d immediately want to turn around and run. That didn’t happen. 

Eliot looked up the moment Quentin entered the room and the smile on his face was so bright and just so  _ Eliot,  _ that for a moment, they weren’t in a hospital room. They were in a tiny little cabin and Teddy was taking his first steps and he was toddling straight into Eliot’s arms and he was smiling and Arielle was laughing and everything was okay…

The flash of brightness that hit him when he remembered made the returning heaviness he felt when it disappeared even more oppressive. 

“Quentin!” Eliot sounded relieved and, more importantly,  _ alive, _ and despite the empty weight in his chest, Quentin couldn’t help but feel a little bit better at the sound of it. 

Eliot made to move, but stopped and groaned, and reluctantly let his weight fall back against the pillows. “Okay, so no moving. Moving bad.”

Quentin grimaced as he made a beeline for the chair at the bedside. “How do you feel?”

“Like I got whacked with an ax and then drugged. Which, lucky enough for me, is pretty much exactly what happened, isn’t it? More importantly, how do you feel?”

Quentin got the sense that the question was a test, and he wasn’t feeling in the mood to try and answer it. 

He shrugged instead. “I’m just glad you’re not dead.”

Eliot squinted. “Is that it? Margo said--”

“Margo needs to stop sticking her nose in places where it doesn’t belong.” Quentin retorted before Eliot could finish.

Eliot looked affronted, and Quentin sighed and shook his head. “I’m sorry. I just… she tried to yell at me a few minutes ago and I’m kind of sick of it. She wasn’t… She wasn’t here, not for a while, and now she’s walking around acting like I’m dying because… because what? Because I fell asleep in the waiting room earlier? Because it’s been a really long couple of days and I’m tired?”

His motor mouth finally stopped running, and he leaned back against the back of the chair. He kept saying things he wasn’t meaning to, half phrased thoughts popping out of his mouth before he could run them past any sort of filter. It was a miracle he hadn’t yet completely put his foot in his mouth. 

Hesitantly, carefully, Eliot tried to respond. “It wasn’t just… She said you woke up screaming, Q. That you cowered in a corner for a good couple of minutes before you’d let anyone touch you. That… that you looked tired and thin and that when you showed up after dumping the bottles, you were shaking and cry--”

Quentin tensed. “It doesn’t matter. I was tired. I know. I know all of that. But she wasn’t… I’m fine. It’s been a long couple of days, and long, stressful, couple of days, but I’m fine. And I’ll be better as soon as we can just…”

“I know. I love my Bambi, but she can be… indelicate. Maybe she just didn’t--”

Quentin shook his head again. “I don’t care. It’s… it’s fine. I’m just tired of people acting like I’m purposefully trying to hurt myself, like I can’t be trusted at all.” 

“People?”

“Yeah. First Kady, then Margo-- I think the only reason Julia hasn’t tried to lecture me yet is because she was sleeping when I woke up.”

Eliot smirked. “Well stick with me, kid. Once everyone sees how shitty I look, no one will even take a second glance at you.

_ Yeah,  _ thought Quentin.  _ That’s kind of part of the problem. _

The other part of the problem was, of course, that it just wasn’t  _ true. _ Eliot couldn’t look shitty if he tried, and even now, with greasy, limp hair and a pallid complexion, he was still just the most fucking stunning creature on the planet. He was laying in a hospital bed, and still, Quentin couldn’t see him as anything less than the High King he was born to be. 

He smiled anyway, and when Eliot reached out to take hold of Quentin’s hand, he let him. 

He’d missed this. So fucking much.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hey so reviews really sustain me. If y'all wanna drop a comment, even if it's just an emoji or a keysmash or whatever, it would mean a lot. Thanks so much for reading!!


	4. Caution

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Eliot tries to be cautious, but unfortunately, it's not something he's all too familiar with.

The entire time the nurse was checking him over, Eliot was thinking and formulating what he’d say when he saw Quentin again. Endless permutations of  _ I’m sorry _ s and  _ I was wrong _ s ran circles through his head, and he thought he had something pretty good worked out when, finally, the nurse left. 

Of course, every single thought in his head ran right out of it the second Quentin actually walked in through the door. 

Because… well, goddamnit but Margo was  _ right.  _ Quentin looked tired and thin and sick and pale, and Eliot hadn’t seen him look so thoroughly downtrodden since that time he got sick, right around Teddy’s eighteenth birthday, and his fever had spiked so high at one point that Eliot had genuinely considered saying “fuck it” to the quest and taking him back to Earth so he could be in a hospital with actual doctors. 

And yet, even despite that, Eliot couldn’t find it in him to dwell on that for long because Quentin was  _ there _ . He was alive and he didn’t hate him and  _ god fucking damnit  _ he was just so  _ relieved.  _

He smiled wider than he had in years at the sight of him. “Quentin!”

He leaned forward, like he could pull him in closer if only he closed the gap, and then gasped when his stitches pulled and he felt pain spike through the layers of painkillers the doctor had put him under. “Okay, so no moving. Moving bad.” He fell back against the pillows

Quentin grimaced and headed for the chair at his bedside. “How do you feel?”

“Like I got whacked with an ax and then drugged. Which, lucky enough for me, is pretty much exactly what happened, isn’t it?” He smiled wryly, then glanced calculatingly at the undereye bruises Quentin was sporting. “More importantly, how do you feel?”

Quentin looked slightly nervous, but shrugged nonchalantly anyway. “I’m just glad you’re not dead.”

Eliot narrowed his eyes, mainly so Quentin wouldn’t notice the quick glance he took at the rest of the man’s all-to-thin body. “Is that it?” he asked. “Margo said--”

“Margo needs to stop sticking her nose in places where it doesn’t belong.” Quentin retorted before Eliot could finish.

He had half a mind to take offense to that on his best friend’s behalf, and was certainly surprised by the venom that had laced his words. He didn’t speak though, and Quentin sighed and shook his head. 

“I’m sorry. I just… she tried to yell at me a few minutes ago and I’m kind of sick of it. She wasn’t… She wasn’t here, not for a while, and now she’s walking around acting like I’m dying because… because what? Because I fell asleep in the waiting room earlier? Because it’s been a really long couple of days and I’m tired?”

He didn’t want to set Quentin off again, and certainly didn’t want to take advantage of the brief silence he had lapsed into while he attempted to get his thoughts together, but carefully, he attempted to construct a response. “It wasn’t just… She said you woke up screaming, Q.” And god didn’t that idea hurt worse than his actual stab-wound. “That you cowered in a corner for a good couple of minutes before you’d let anyone touch you. That… that you looked tired and thin and that when you showed up after dumping the bottles, you were shaking and cry--”

Quentin visibly tensed, and Eliot had a moment to regret going too far before he spoke. “It doesn’t matter. I was tired. I know. I know all of that. But she wasn’t… I’m fine. It’s been a long couple of days, and long, stressful, couple of days, but I’m fine. And I’ll be better as soon as we can just…”

“I know.” No he didn’t. Well, he did, but all he actually knew was that Quentin was lying, maybe even to himself. Still, he pushed on. “I love my Bambi, but she can be… indelicate. Maybe she just didn’t--”

Quentin shook his head again. “I don’t care. It’s… it’s fine. I’m just tired of people acting like I’m purposefully trying to hurt myself, like I can’t be trusted at all.” 

“People?”

“Yeah. First Kady, then Margo-- I think the only reason Julia hasn’t tried to lecture me yet is because she was sleeping when I woke up.”

Eliot smirked, and tried to make light of the situation. “Well stick with me, kid. Once everyone sees how shitty I look, no one will even take a second glance at you.” 

Quentin gave a small, brief, almost fake smile, but he  _ smiled, _ and Eliot was so relieved to see it that he couldn’t stop himself from reaching out a hand towards him. He felt light when Quentin took it. 

He’d missed him so much. 

Part of him still wanted to have that ever important  _ I’m sorry _ conversation, but Eliot couldn’t bring himself to try and put all that on him right then. Instead, he cautiously took a stab at coaxing Quentin to get some actual sleep.

“No offense, Q, but really, maybe you should go grab a few winks in an actual bed?”

OK, so maybe that wasn’t really cautious enough, because Quentin’s nose wrinkled and his eyes narrowed. 

“No lecture here, Q, but you really--”

“I’m fine.”

“I know that. I know you are. But also, you seem like you’re seconds away from falling flat on your face and you said it yourself that you’re tired. Can you just--”

“You know what? Fine. Whatever.” He ripped his hand away from Eliot’s and stood. Eliot immediately resented the loss. He stormed out of the room, despite Eliot’s pleas for him to stop and listen for a moment.

Well, he’d really fucked that one up, hadn’t he?

* * *

Quentin regretted leaving the way he did the instant he passed through the doorway. He knew Eliot was right. He knew he needed sleep. 

But it also made him think that Eliot didn’t want him around, and that just hurt and confused him. And logically, he should know that Eliot wanting him to get sleep an Eliot not wanting him around weren’t the same thing, that Eliot was just looking out for him, and yet the only thing that ran through his head the second he’d suggested Quentin leaving was “He’s irritated by you. He wants you to go away and disappear and never come back.”

He didn’t stop to talk to Margo, or to say hi to Josh, who Penny must have brought back to Earth. He heard Josh call out to him, but he couldn’t handle the idea of having to talk to someone else today, and so he headed straight for the door. 

He hardly thought about where his feet were taking him or where he’d end up when he was finished walking. When he found himself at the door of the Physical Kids Cottage, he was taken aback for a minute. He hadn’t slept there in months, not since he’d become Brian, and he couldn’t be sure that his bedroom would even still be there. His other option was returning to the apartment though, and the thought of his bedroom there was repugnant enough to get him to open the door. He couldn’t deal with the thought of a bed he’d spent so long getting accustomed to the monster being in or near. He couldn’t bring himself to return to the place that harbored so many horrifying memories.

The cottage was empty of people when he stepped foot inside, and Everett’s bloody, disembodied hand was still in the corner in front of the mirror. The air and dust seemed notably undisturbed, leading him to believe that no one, student or otherwise, had set foot in the building since he, Alice, and Penny had left following their mirror realm excursion. 

_ Was _ Quentin even still a student, he wondered? Were any of them? If he was still enrolled, he was definitely doing incredibly poorly, considering he hadn’t been to a class since… well, since magic had first been turned off. Julia, at least, had sort of been enrolled when she’d become Kim, but given that she hadn’t been a student as Julia, did that count? Margo and Eliot were in even worse shape, if they could be counted as students, given that they hadn’t been part of school events since they’d been crowned High King and Queen of Fillory so long ago. 

His brain hurt trying to figure all of it out, and he decided to stop trying, opting instead to climb the stairs to the second floor and head to where his bedroom had been. 

It seemed the room hadn’t been disturbed in months, not since the last time he’d slept there. His bed was still unmade in the center, and there was a tshirt hanging over his desk chair, a plain black one that must have been there since he’d removed it the night before they went to Blackspire. His Fillory and Further books were still in a stack on his desk, and all of his posters were still up on the walls. 

He wasn’t sure how the bed had remained dust-free-- could beds even  _ get  _ dusty?-- but he was thankful for it as he sprawled, still fully dressed, over the comforter and relaxed into the mattress.

Exhaustion weighed heavy on him, and yet his mind would not quiet. 

What the actual  _ fuck _ were they supposed to do now?

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I wasn't sure if the mirror to the mirror realm was in the PK cottage, but I assumed, based on set design. I might have been wrong but idk. Poetic license? Maybe? 
> 
> Also, I'm going to treat the cottage like it's been standing empty since magic came back. Like, after the quest and that whole thing about it not technically being part of the campus, the school found a new cottage for the PK's to be in and left the old one as was? 
> 
> Please Please please leave a comment. I can't tell you how much they mean to me, and they're what drives me to write more! Thanks so much for reading!


	5. Apologies

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Josh deserves the world. Margo's not THAT self destructive.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'm sorry this took me so long to get up. I've been trying to work on it whenever I can, but i haven't had much time. I hope y'all enjoy though!!

Margo came back into Eliot’s room a few minutes after Quentin stormed out. She was quiet and seemed a little like she’d gotten a dressing down, which would make sense if Quentin had been feeling confrontational when they’d spoken. 

“Q left in quite a hurry,” she noted as she sat down. “Didn’t even say hi to Josh.”

“Yeah, well, he’s not exactly thrilled with anyone right now. You never did say-- how long was he bad for?”

He was trying to do this as delicately as possible, feeling around the fractures in his two best friends’ relationship gingerly, so he could properly address the issues without making anyone mad. 

His first step, of course, was to determine how truthful Quentin was being. 

Margo seemed as frustrated as he’d ever seen her. “I’m not sure. I-- honestly, I wasn’t around much. I spent most of the time in Fillory, being dethroned by Fen and tripping on magical lizard sweat in the desert.”

“What the fuck, Bambi?”

“How’d you think I got those bomb-ass axes? But yeah, the point is, I wasn’t really around.”

“But it was since before you came back, wasn’t it?”

That silenced her, and Eliot couldn’t help but feel slightly angry at her for having no defense.

“Are you…” she finally started, but paused for a moment, evidently trying to rephrase. “Are you really upset with me for not being there?”

“No, I’m upset that he was stuck with a monster wearing my skin as a costume for months and no one thought that huh, maybe Quentin wouldn’t deal with that so well and might need a little support.”

“I couldn’t be there, El. I couldn’t-- how was I supposed to look at that thing every day?”

“I don’t know. How was he?”

“He did it. He managed. And he came out the other side breathing, which is more than I could have said for myself in the same situation.”

“Yeah, but how did you know that he would? How could you possibly have been even close to sure?”

“So you are upset with me.” 

“Okay, maybe I am. A little. But after… I wasn’t the only one who decided to shoot the Monster instead of allowing Quentin to lock himself in Blackspire for the rest of forever! That was a you-plan as well, and… what happened? I disappear and all of a sudden, any protective instinct you had for him goes with it?”

“It didn’t! I just-- there was a lot of shit going on El. You weren’t there! You didn’t see… you didn’t have to deal with any of it, and no, it’s not like any of us would want to trade with you or whatever, but the fact is you have no idea what was going on. Josh was stuck in a fuck or kill situation. We had all just had at least two decades worth of information shoved back into our heads. Ember was incepting the shit outta me, giving me all these instructions and telling me to go back to Fillory and you-- we thought you were dead! So I’m sorry that I was a little too preoccupied dealing with the fact that I was just fucked into being a werewolf and had to go back to being High King of Rated R Narnia and just lost my best friend to pay attention to whether or not Quentin was doing okay!”

That whole monologue, and the only thing Eliot could focus on… “You let Josh turn you into a werewolf?”

“Don’t change the fucking subject, El. You can’t--” she stopped still, then groaned and let her head drop.

“What is it?”

“Nothing. I just realized that Coldwater may have had a point.”

And…. mark him lost. 

“A point about what?”

“... Forget it. Do you have any idea where he went?”

“Who, Quentin? Not really. He stormed out after I gently suggested it might be a good idea to get some sleep.”

Margo winced. “Yeah, he’s been pretty touchy. You okay if I go find him?”

Eliot was relieved she seemed to want to fix things, and he nodded eagerly. “I want a nap anyway. Be ready to talk when you get back. I want to hear all the tea about what’s been happening while I was out.”

She nodded less enthusiastically, and stood, bending to press a kiss to his forehead before making for the door. 

Nothing she’d been talking about made much sense at all, but Eliot figured he’d understand more about it if he’d been awake when it happened. He hated that he missed so much of what happened. He hated that he’d spent the better part of the last few months stuck in a mental prison while a monster wreaked havoc on his body and the world around him. 

And yet, he knew he would’ve made the same choice, if he could do it over again. It was all worth it to have Quentin alive and here rather than stuck endlessly in a prison on his own. Okay, he admitted as he thought back to Quentin’s exhausted eyes and too-thin frame. Maybe not completely worth it. But worth it enough. At least this he could heal from. 

But he couldn’t help but be disappointed in his friends. He’d hoped they would’ve known to be there for him, or that they would’ve at least tried, but it was becoming more and more apparent to him that no one was really able to open their eyes and see what was happening in front of them. Would it have been so hard to turn the lights on once in a while? He knew Quentin liked it when the lights were on, that first night by the mosaic was so hard for him without any electricity and no candles either and he could remember Quentin hesitantly climbing into bed with him to seek comfort from the darkness and their eyes had closed and they’d been so happy. He loved seeing him happy. Smiling. His smile. God but he had the most amazing smile…

With a shake of his head, Eliot realized that nothing he was thinking was really making sense anymore and he put aside his half-coherent wonderings and closed him eyes. He fell asleep before he could really understand that he was.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Quentin couldn’t really remember falling asleep. He remembered trying to figure out what his next steps would be, and then he remembered thinking about how long it would take Eliot to heal, and then Eliot was suddenly lying in his bed at the cottage by the mosaic and he was smiling at him and laughing and he pulled back the blankets and there was an entire plate of cookies beside him and as Quentin went to go pick one up it suddenly wasn’t a plate of cookies anymore, but a bloody pig’s head and Quentin had just plucked out its eye and then Eliot wasn’t smiling kindly anymore, he was bearing his teeth and then his voice changed and it wasn’t Eliot anymore, but the monster, and they weren’t in their cottage anymore, they were in Castle Blackspire and someone was knocking on the door… And then he was opening eyes he hadn’t realized he’d closed and his heart pounded in his chest like he’d run a hundred miles. 

His head ached as he lifted it off of the pillows, and so he let it fall again and lay still, wondering if he’d really heard a knocking at the door at all. 

“Quentin?” a muffled voice sounded outside of the door. He couldn’t place who it was; he was too tired to try. Instead, he groaned as loudly as he could muster and hoped whoever it was would take that as a hint to come inside. 

The door swung open. Josh grinned at him from the doorway. He held a plate of cookies. Quentin wanted to throw up.

“I made cookies!” Josh announced, unnecessarily. 

Quentin jerked his head in an approximation of a nod. “I noticed.” 

Josh seemed to take that as an invitation to drop the plate of his desk and sit in the desk chair. “So, is this where you were running off so fast earlier that you couldn’t stop and say hi?”

He grimaced. “Sorry. It’s just… It’s been a long few days.”

“Yeah, I figured after I saw that severed hand on the floor by the mirror. I cleaned that up by the way. You’re welcome.”

That summoned an image in his head of a severed hand lying on the floor and the urge to vomit got stronger. Quentin resisted and, with a heavy sigh, pulled himself up so he was sitting on the bed instead of lying prone. Josh watched him do it, and once he had, grinned. “So anyway, I made cookies, and, if you wanna join us downstairs, I made lunch too. 

“Us?” 

“Yeah. Me and you and Margo and whoever else comes by. I know Julia was planning on eating after she showered. With Eliot out of commission, I figured none of you had eaten anything decent since I left.”

He was right, of course, and as Quentin stopped and took stock of how he felt, he was surprised to note that he could do with some real food as well. He actually had an appetite for the first time in a little while, and so he got out of bed and let Josh lead him downstairs. 

“Thanks,” he said as they walked.

“Trust me, it’s for all of our benefit.”

“Not just for the food. Just… thanks. For not asking me if I’m okay or trying to tell me I’m--”

“Lectures don’t work,” he said simply. “And how fucked up would it be if I just strutted into the room and tried to shame you for your coping mechanisms after I just spent the last who knows how long in Fillory trying to seduce Margo into an actual relationship with feelings and shit.”

Hm. So Josh and Margo were a thing. Quentin couldn’t really say he was all too surprised. But he’d be lying if he said he wasn’t caught off guard a bit. He’d thought Margo and Fen were building up to something, but it wouldn’t be the first time he’d misinterpreted signals. He was convinced for days after their bank heist that Julia and Kady were making eyes at each other, only to remember that Kady was still very obviously in love with Penny and be proven wrong.

“Anyway,” Josh continued, “asking if someone’s okay in situations like this doesn’t make any major difference. All it really does is make people angry. And I doubt I’d get the truth if I did ask.”

Okay, so he was right again. Did Josh ever get tired of being right all the time, Quentin wondered?  Was  he right all the time? Or did it just feel that way now? 

Margo was sitting at the table when they got downstairs. She looked up cooly. “Well, look who’s awake,” she commented. She didn’t sound mean, or, at least, no meaner than normal. Just brusque and kind of impatient. So maybe he’d misinterpreted her expression. 

Maybe he just always thought she looked cold. 

Josh disappeared into the kitchen, and Quentin sat down a couple of seats away from Margo, a wary distance. She watched him do it, then sighed and moved closer. 

“I realized that… okay so maybe you had a point. I… I shouldn’t have acted like I was mad at you for… I wasn’t there. I know I wasn’t there. And I’m pissed that I wasn’t, that I couldn’t help from the homefront. It’s not like being dragged off to Fillory was my choice, okay? Being there without El, it’s like a hellscape. Being here, facing him everyday, it might’ve been worse, but I wouldn’t know. And at least if I was here, I could’ve mabe noticed what was happening and dragged you out of that state you put yourself in--”

Wait. She  cared????

“-- but I wasn’t. And it was worth it in the end, but maybe yelling at you like you reacting the way most people probably would’ve in your situation wasn’t fair.”

And okay, so maybe he resented the implication that he wasn’t okay. He  knew  he wasn’t, but that didn’t mean he liked people insinuating it to him. But he also felt vindicated in Margo admitting he had a point, and he chose to focus on that instead. 

He was trying to think of a way to say that to her without making her upset when Josh reentered the room, carrying a tray with three steaming bowls of soup and a basket of breadsticks on it. Margo moved away as he did, and sent a wink Quentin’s direction, which he accepted with a nod before getting up to help Josh unload the tray. 

Food distributed, Josh sat, a smile on his face that seemed just a little  too  innocent to be real, and Quentin would have to be an idiot not to notice the triumphant looks Margo and Josh exchanged when he started in on the bowl in front of him. 

Because it was a real accomplishment to get him to eat Josh’s soup, he was sure. Who the hell wouldn’t? It was delicious, obviously.

And the best part was that he didn’t have to exert the energy on making it himself. Because fucking hell was he still so tired. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Listen, I am so fucking convinced that Josh has the highest EQ on the show. Also, Margo/Fen/Josh are the OT3 we deserve. Also, Julia/Kady should be endgame. These are just facts. 
> 
> Please leave a comment if you felt any time of way about what I wrote. Positive, negative, whatever. I need to know if people are interested if I'm gonna continue. Thanks so much!!!


	6. Manipulation

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Julia talks. Quentin doesn't listen.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Super short chapter because I wanted something uploaded and I have very little time.

Quentin had gotten about halfway through his soup when Julia came downstairs, hair wet and braided down her back.

“Something smells good,” she commented as she approached the table.

“Mushroom barley soup,” Josh told her. “There’s more in the pot on the stove if you’re interested.” 

She smiled. “I think I might take you up on that.”

She brushed her hand over Quentin’s shoulder as she passed, and was gone for a minute before coming back with a full bowl of soup for herself. She sat down beside him and barely glanced at him before starting to eat. 

He wasn’t sure he preferred this… Did he want Julia stiffly avoiding his gaze for the most part? Or did he want her to look at him, even though he knew her glances were going to be full of her soft pity and discomfort? 

Julia let out a sudden grunt of contentment. “Josh, this is incredible. Best soup I’ve had in a while.”

Josh grinned widely. “Well, nice to know my talents are appreciated. Hey, I was thinking of maybe taking some to Eliot. You guys think he’d like that?”

“I’m sure he’ll appreciate not having to eat shitty infirmary food at the very least,” Julia replied with a wry grin. 

Margo stood. “I’ll go put it in a thermos. Josh, help me find one?”

It was a clear and pitiful attempt to leave Quentin alone with Julia, and he couldn’t say he appreciated it, but Josh went along with it all the same, standing and following Margo into the kitchen. 

Julia watched them leave, then turned to look him in the eye. He almost attempted to head off whatever lecture she was going to give, but realized he had nothing to say. 

She seemed to, however. “So how are you doing, Q?”

He rolled his eyes. “Peachy. How are you?”

“Don’t change the subject.”

“I’m not trying to. There’s nothing to talk about. Things are shitty but I’m fine.”

“Are you? Because the last time you woke up screaming the way you did in the waiting room, we were sixteen, and you tried to kill yourself two days later.”

“I’m not going to kill myself, Jules.”

“Promise?”

He scoffed. “Are you saying you care? Now, you care? A month ago, when I was about to let the monster strangle me, that didn’t warrant a conversation, but now? Now that it’s all over with? Now you want to talk me out of suicide?”

“I wanted it to be over first!” she protested. “I know… I swear I wanted to say something. I’m sorry I didn’t. I just… I got wrapped up in goddess shit, and you were so far embedded in the Monster shit that I thought nothing would change if I tried to address it then. Clearly, I was wrong--”

“It doesn’t matter. Right or wrong I… I needed help. I needed someone to pull my head out of my ass and I had no one.”

“You had me, if you’d just said something--”

“No, I didn’t. I couldn’t… What the fuck was I supposed to say, Julia? ‘Hey, I know you’re struggling with losing all of your magic for our sakes and I appreciate what you’re already doing to help me, but seeing the man I’m kind of in love with be possessed by an all-powerful, murderous monster is kind of killing me and I don’t know what do and I need you to put down your shit to help me not lose my entire fucking mind?’”

“Yeah, actually. That would’ve been-- Wait. In  _ love _ with?”

Well shit. He hadn’t meant to say that. 

He tried to brush it off. “Not like that--”

“Then like what? Q, I’m not that oblivious. I knew there was something there. I just thought you were too wrapped up in Alice to notice yourself. If I knew you were aware of it, I would’ve--”

“Just stop. I’ve had enough with would haves, thanks.”

“Okay. Fine. Let’s put the ‘love’ thing on the back burner for a minute, then.” She melted back into the chair and looked pleadingly up at the ceiling. “I can’t read minds, Q. How am I supposed to know you need help if you don’t say anything?”

“You knew, Julia. You admitted you knew already. So cut the crap.”

“I didn’t know it was that bad--”

“But you knew it was bad. Period. And you did nothing. I’m not… fuck, Jules, I’m not saying you had an obligation to help, or that your shit should’ve taken a backseat to mine, but… I said this to Margo too. It’s too much, too late. You want to help me avoid a meltdown? You should’ve started a month ago. The meltdown has happened, Julia. Lecturing me on should haves is only going to make me feel like shit. It’s a manipulation tactic to exonerate yourself from whatever shitty misplaced guilt you have after doing what sane people do and dealing with your own shit before trying to pull other people out of holes. And I-- I don’t appreciate it, okay? You’re not at fault for letting me get myself into an episode, because that’s bullshit, but please… just… Don’t start trying to manipulate me into consoling you when what you mean is to help me or apologize.”

And with that, he stood. “I’m going to shower. See you later, Jules.”

He left her staring at him like he’d just ripped her heart out and went in search of a towel.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you all for all of the kind words. Please keep it up. It makes me want to put things up. I will try to respond to your comments when I get a chance. Thanks again!!


	7. Maturity

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Eliot eats some soup. Quentin remembers his childhood.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> It took me so long to finish this chapter. It's a little ridiculous. I hope it's okay. I hope y'all enjoy!

Eliot woke up when Margo and Josh came charging into his room with a thermos. A fucking  _ thermos _ . What the fuck?

“We come bearing gifts!” Josh announced as he approached the bed. He uncapped the thermos and poured a portion of its contents into the cup. 

It smelled delicious, of fucking course, and it left a hunger pang shooting through his stomach. Still though, for a proclaimed  _ gift, _ it was slightly underwhelming.

He had enough tact not to say that though, and instead, accepted the cup with a smile. Okay, a grimace. “How generous,” he said drily. Well, maybe he didn’t  _ quite  _ have that much tact.

“Hey,” Margo protested, “don’t be a douche, El. We can just take it back if you don’t want it--”

“No!” he interjected, a bit too desperately for his own liking. It did smell really good, after all. “Have you seen the hospital food? I don’t think you can even really call it food, like legally, I don’t think it’s allowed.”

Margo shrugged and sat on the edge of his bed while Josh took the chair. Josh still looked a bit upset, and, feeling guilty, Eliot inhaled the soup deeply. 

“It does smell really good. Thank you.” 

The other man brightened considerably and smiled. “You’re welcome. I’m sorry it wasn’t--”

“It didn’t have to be. I was just being a dick. Side effects of being bedridden. Or just side effects of being me. Can’t quite figure out which one it is right now, but it doesn’t really matter, does it?”

Margo passed him a plastic spoon, and Eliot dug in, letting out an almost orgasmic moan when the first drops hit his tongue. He realized with a start that this was the first food he could remember eating since before they went to Blackspire, and he and Margo stayed up until 3 AM, gorging themselves on donuts and leftover mac and cheese, before passing out in a pile of limbs on the couch. 

That was when they’d made the plan to stop Quentin from selling his soul to the immortal prison guard life. He remembered Margo nonchalantly mentioning the god killing bullet as she took a bite out of a powdered donut, spewing sweet white dust that settled over the counter top like layers of fresh snow. He remembered the fire behind her eyes as she insisted that they had to find a way to save him, that any other option was bullshit. 

He wasn’t sure what had changed, but he didn’t like that it did. 

“So,” he started in between spoonfuls, “did you find Quentin?” 

“I did,” Margo replied, “and we talked. And it’s all good. We got him to eat, which is the real victory here, and we think he slept.”

“Did either of you realize that we’re talking about a grown ass man like he’s an infant?” Josh interjected, and Margo rolled her eyes.

“No, we’re talking about him like he’s been in a bad place for a while and we’ve done too little to pull him out of it.”

“To the surprise of no one, the two have a shocking amount of overlap,” Eliot said wryly, “only in Quentin’s case we probably shouldn’t be speaking about it like that almost at all.”

“Point taken,” Margo noted. “On that note, how are you feeling, El?”

He winced. “Ew. Can we go back to talking about Quentin?”

“Don’t avoid the topic. Do you need more meds?”

“Stop Mama Bearing. I’m okay. Better than ever now that I have some good food. Thank you, Josh, by the way.”

Josh beamed. It was a little sad how easy it was to make him happy. Maybe that would be his next project. 

“So,” Eliot said, desperate to not talk for a little while, “you didn’t explain what you meant earlier by ‘tripping on lizard sweat.’”

Margo looked only too happy to start off on her story, and Eliot settled in for a solid few minutes of just being able to quietly enjoy his soup. 

Talking was overrated anyway.

* * *

Freshly clean and wearing sweatpants and a t-shirt that were definitely a size too large now, but he distinctly remembered only just fitting him the last time he wore them, Quentin forced himself to go downstairs instead of crawling back into bed like he’d wanted to do. He hoped he could make it out of the cottage and to the infirmary to see Eliot before he was confronted by anyone he knew, but, of course, that didn’t seem to be a possibility. 

Penny accosted him as he got to the bottom of the stairs. 

“Listen, dude, I don’t know what the fuck you said to Julia, but she’s crying and I have the strangest feeling like that’s your fault.”

“Listen,  _ dude,”  _ Quentin taunted back, “you need to fucking back off and stop acting like you’re her own personal superhero. Last I checked, she was pretty pissed at you too.”

It looked like that hit him where it hurt, but Penny was a champion at pushing on despite it, and so Quentin wasn’t surprised when, without blinking, he had a retort ready.

“So you did do something then. Fucking hell, Coldwater, you need to apologize or something--”

“I don’t  _ need  _ to do anything. I  _ didn’t _ do anything except tell her the truth. I’m not going to apologize for finally having a little bit of self respect. And you don’t know anything about the situation except that a girl you think you’re in love with is crying, and a guy you already have a grudge against seems to be the cause, and so somewhere in your fucked up sense of justice, that equates to you needing to bully me into making her happy again, even if it means allowing her to continue to manipulate me into feeling shittier and shittier about myself if it’ll make her feel better. Maybe, just maybe, instead of being concerned that what I’m doing to stand up for myself is hurting her, you need to think about how to repent for the fact you, as a fucking  _ psychic _ , couldn’t think of a way to heal Julia that involved letting her make her own decision.”

If Penny was irate before, that didn’t hold a candle to the anger he expressed then. He didn’t have a chance to act on it though, because Julia came rushing over and immediately stepped between the two of them. 

“Penny, stop.”

“Me? Coldwater’s the one--”

“You sound like a two year old, and to be fair, he’s not wrong. Just stop.”

She grabbed Quentin by the wrist and pulled him with her, steering him around a belligerent Penny and through the door. Thankfully, he didn’t try to follow.

“Sorry to drag you like that,” Julia said as she let go of his wrist and they began walking in the direction of the hospital. “I really hope you weren’t planning on staying in the cottage, because I don’t think Penny would take a return very well right now.”

“I wasn’t. I was going to go see Eliot, actually.” 

She let out a small, almost surprised sounding, “Oh.” 

“What?”

“Nothing, I guess. I just… I didn’t think you were…”

“I’ve told you by now how I feel about him.”

“I know. That’s not what I meant. I was just… I was surprised enough to see you come downstairs, let alone with the intent of going out. The look in your eyes…”

“Yes, well. I think we’ve also established that you, apparently, aren’t as familiar with my signals as you once were.”

She winced, and he thought in a sort of detached way that he must have exhausted his emotion-processing capacity for the day, because he didn’t feel bad about it the way he normally would have. Maybe he should have gone back to bed instead of trying to go see Eliot. 

“I--” Julia started, then paused. “I’ve been thinking about our… well, I guess it wasn’t really a conversation so much as--”

“It doesn’t matter what it was. Let’s not get hung up on semantics, shall we?”

“I guess... I-- the point is, I’m sorry. I didn’t realize what I was doing--”

“I know you didn’t. It’s why I called you out. I probably should have done it less meanly--”

“No. You were fine. I was the one--”

“It’s fine. Can we not talk about this right now? This seems like exactly the kind of conversation that’s going to tire me out, and I’d like to be in Eliot’s room longer than five minutes before someone kicks me out to go back to sleep.”

She looked a little bit crestfallen, but nodded, and they kept walking in silence. 

It didn’t sit that well with him that she was disappointed. It almost seemed like she had this whole grand speech prepared that she thought would make him forgive her instantly, and she never was great at being cut off. The fact that she did stop talking anyway showed that it was a sincere speech, though; she really did feel bad, and wasn’t just going off on a performative rant to guilt Quentin into forgiving her. 

It wasn’t like she hadn’t had her fair share of those in the past, he considered. Julia had always meant well, but their friendship had also always been marked by a competitiveness, and he’d noticed long ago that she seemed to take an undue amount of pleasure in being the nice one, the socially conscious one, the magnanimous one. She had this habit of treating Quentin almost like her project when they were in high school, making a show of being his friend, and always acting like she was doing him a favor by apologizing if he was upset. “Look at me, Julia the wise, the kind, the wonderful! Aren’t I such a good person for being your friend?”

But she did care about him, he knew. It wasn’t like they didn’t have anything in common, and there was a genuine love behind it all. But he also knew that she resented not being in the position of power in the relationship. She didn’t like when he knew something she didn’t. She didn’t like not being the protagonist of the relationship. 

The sincerity of her apology, though, made him think that she had at least gone through some sort of character development-- she was more mature than she was in high school, at least, which  _ thank the fucking lord _ , but also, he’d be disappointed if she wasn’t. 

Finally, after minutes of uncomfortable silence, they arrived, and Julia tensely told him that she’d leave him to his visit and walked off, back the way they came. It rose questions of why she’d bothered walking him all the way there in the first place if she wasn’t planning on coming inside with him, but he dismissed them as he walked through the door. He couldn’t say he was upset to see her go, after all.

Margo, Josh, and Eliot were laughing about something when he entered the room. He had a moment of panic before they noticed he was there, and he almost convinced himself that they’d be upset to see him, that he should leave before he could ruin the mood, but then Eliot saw him and a brilliant smile overtook his face and Quentin couldn’t have left if the universe demanded it. 

“Quentin!” Eliot proclaimed, and Quentin remembered him and Margo barbecuing behind the cottage before all of this shit started, back when his biggest worry was getting kicked out of Brakebills and the Beast coming back. 

Margo and Josh turned, and any worry that they’d be upset to see him disappeared when they both shot him grins of their own and beckoned him over. Eliot patted an empty spot on the bed by his hip, just big enough for Quentin to sit there. He complied, perching himself on the offered spot, and something warm blossomed in his numb chest when Eliot took hold of his hand and intertwined their fingers. 

“You’re just in time,” Josh informed him. “Margo was just telling us about when she and Eliot convinced a teacher they had an exemption from taking his midterm in their first year.”

Margo laughed. “Yeah, you’re in for a great story, Coldwater, so sit tight and listen up.”

Quentin half grinned and nodded for her to continue. She obliged, and he gripped Eliot’s hand tighter and just enjoyed being welcome in the room. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'm not saying Penny's the worst, but 23 and Julia's relationship is, and I miss Penny 40 with every fiber of my being. 
> 
> Also, I broke my promise and I watched season 5 and now I'm heartbroken and planning a new fanfiction to help me recover. It's an Umbrella Academy/Magicians crossover, so if anyone would be interested, let me know!
> 
> Please leave a comment! Passover starts tonight, and I won't be online until Saturday night. I can't tell you how good it feels to turn my phone on and see all of your kind words. They keep me sustained and afloat and give me life. 
> 
> Happy Passover to those of you who celebrate it, and Happy Easter for those of you who have it coming up!


	8. Feelings

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Eliot is brave.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I wanted something up before the second days of Passover started, so here's a short little chapter.

Quentin didn’t remember falling asleep, but he must have, because he woke up to a dark room and his head pillowed on Eliot’s chest as the other man slept. Quentin’s arm lay draped over Eliot’s waist, hand resting only inches away from the wound, and Eliot’s arm clutched Quentin tightly around his shoulders. 

He tried not to shift so he wouldn’t wake Eliot, but either he failed, or Eliot just had a sixth sense for these things, because with a sharp intake of breath, he was opening his eyes, and Quentin wanted to feel bad for waking him, but he couldn’t deny the bubble of happiness that rose in his chest when, instead of pushing him away, Eliot pulled him in closer.

“You’re thinking too loudly, Q,” Eliot mumbled sleepily. “Go back to sleep, hmm?”

“Sorry. I just don’t remember…”

“You fell asleep a little bit before Margo and Josh left. I figured it was better to let you sleep, and I don’t mind the company. Lucky we’re not in a real hospital, or they’d probably make you leave. Lipson was a little kinder.”

Quentin nodded into Eliot’s chest, and was content to try and go back to sleep, but as tired as he still felt, he was wide awake, and instead of letting himself continue to lie there staring at the wall, he forced himself to extricate himself from Eliot’s grip. The man immediately protested, but Quentin forced himself to brush it off. 

“I’m sorry to leave you like this,” he muttered. “I just--”

“Wait,” Eliot let him sit up, but stopped him from standing with a hand on his wrist. “I don’t know if this is about... I was wrong, Q.”

Well, that gave him pause. Try as he might, he couldn’t understand what Eliot was getting at, and he told him as much. “You’ve lost me. I just need to move. What’s wrong?”

Eliot looked troubled. “I promised myself I would be brave when I was no longer playing host to… you know who. And I-- the timing wasn’t quite right to fulfill my promise, but I think… I think it’s time to be brave. Like you taught me to.”

“That’s not any clearer, El.”

“I lied, Quentin. When we got our memories back, in Fillory,  _ of  _ Fillory. After Margo stopped us, when you said… when you asked if we could give us a shot. I lied when I said no.”

And oh, but didn’t that shift Quentin’s entire worldview. 

“I was scared, and when I’m scared I do shitty things like run, or self destruct, or hurt the things that could be good for me. I was scared of getting hurt, of it not working, and I shut it down before I had a chance to destroy it all. I shouldn’t have. Because the truth of the matter is that you mean more to me than almost anything else, and if there’s anything I regret, it’s not giving us a chance to work.”

Quentin stared, hardly letting himself believe it. He’d been struggling fruitlessly to get over Eliot ever since he’d turned him down, and now, here he was saying it was all a lie? What… what the fuck was he supposed to do with that?

Eliot continued. “I don’t know-- I heard Alice has been back so I don’t know if--”

“No.” Fuck he didn’t even want to think about Alice. “We don’t… We don’t work. We know we don’t work. She still has a lot of work to do before she can forgive herself, and even if you disregard all of the shit that’s gone down since she died, what I did to her and what she did to us… We didn’t work. Our relationship while we were together was more lust than anything else anyway. I love her, I always will, but we can’t be together.”

Eliot looked visibly relieved. “Oh.” 

Everything in Quentin told him to kiss him. He still didn’t. 

“But I don’t--”

“Right. Of course. I can’t expect you to still--”

“No!” Fuck. “No, El… I’m not saying I don’t… want this. I… god, I don’t think you have any idea how much I love you. But I’m not…”

“No, I get it. Not like that.”

“Eliot, just-- stop a minute, okay? I’m not in a good place, El! I’m… Things aren’t good. They haven’t been, not since Fogg’s spell broke and we got our memories back, and they’ve only gotten worse. I’ve… I’m… I- I want to be with you, El, but I also have a lot of…”

“Oh.” He looked pensive, yet oddly pleased. “I… I can’t lie, I’m… not thrilled, but you’re right. We both… You aren’t the only one who has recovery to get through, and you’re right. Jumping straight into a relationship probably wouldn’t be helpful. To either of us. But-- Q, I don’t know how to put aside my feelings for you, or--”

“I don’t want you to, El. God knows I won’t. I’m just… this needs to go slow, El. That’s all.”

Eliot nodded, and Quentin stood.

“And I’m sorry, Eliot, but part of that is me leaving right now.”

He nodded again, and Quentin couldn’t resist leaning down and pressing a kiss to his curls before turning and walking out the door. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I know some of you might not be thrilled with me for not letting them get together, but I think it was important to recognize that neither Quentin nor Eliot are in a great position to be getting together, and they both need to recover a bit before they can really decide "okay, we're boyfriends now." It's also important for both of them to see and accept that. They aren't the same people who went to castle Blackspire-- they've both been changed by the experiences since then, and there's still some coming to terms with everything that both of them need to do. We also can't forget that Eliot still turned Quentin down, and a confession now doesn't mean Quentin can just ignore that. 
> 
> I'm hoping for there to be two more chapters before the end of this story, one with a couple more much needed conversations, and one with a bit of wrap up. I've also broken my promise to myself and started working on the Umbrella Academy/Magicians crossover, so make sure to stay tuned for that!
> 
> I love turning my phone on and seeing your feedback, so please, please, please, try and leave a comment! I want to know what y'all thought of the Queliot situation!
> 
> Thanks for reading!


	9. Honesty

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Alice is the smartest cookie.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'm so sorry for the long wait! I've been trying to write this chapter for forever but it hasn't been happening. It's shorter than I'd like it to be, but I wanted this to be separate from the next chapter so you're stuck with shorter. Please enjoy!!

Alice was sitting on the couch when Quentin entered the Cottage. 

“I was wondering if you’d be back tonight,” she said. 

He sat on the other side of the couch. She turned to face him, but he didn’t do the same. 

“Josh mentioned you fell asleep on Eliot’s bed. I thought you might stay there.”

He didn’t respond. He didn’t know what to say. He felt like she wanted a conversation, and yet the idea of getting into things with her wasn’t appealing. He thought that maybe if he didn’t say anything, she’d leave him be. 

If only he was so lucky.

“Listen, Quentin--”

“What?”

“I wanted… I thought I should apologize.”

Okay,  _ what? _

“What do you mean, apologize?”

“I didn’t… I’m sorry I didn’t realize how bad things had gotten for you. I didn’t think. I got… I forgot that you might have moved on. So I got really wrapped up in thinking about you as ‘mine,’ even though we weren’t together, and I don’t… I didn’t realize how everything with Eliot might have been affecting you. And I should have. I saw you that day in the park. I saw the way you looked after Eliot broke through. I should have figured it out then. And I’m sorry for not pulling you out, for not even trying.”

“I-- Alice…”

“Don’t. I wasn’t there and I know that’s because you didn’t want me to be and I know that also means I didn’t see a lot of what happened while I was gone, but I saw enough. Or, at least, I saw what should have been enough. And I’m sorry.” 

There was a long silence. None of that was exactly what he was expecting to hear from her, especially not considering the lectures and comments he’d been getting from everyone else. He honestly didn’t know how to respond. 

“I don’t… I admit, I wasn’t expecting that. It’s not… I don’t blame you; you know that right? I don’t… I don’t blame any of you. It’s not your fault, or anyone else’s. I’ve given a lot of shit to a lot of the others, but… it’s only because I can’t abide by them… I don’t want them to blame  _ themselves _ but I don’t want them to blame me either. They were trying to help me, but the wrong way, and way too late. But that’s not… I don’t blame you, is the point. And you shouldn’t be blaming yourself either.”

Alice chuckled humorlessly. “Well that’s new.”

Finally, he looked at her. “Don’t get me wrong, Alice. You’re not perfect. It’s not like you’ve never done anything worth making up for.”

She scowled, and he put a hand on her shoulder. “Which you’ve done. You’ve made up for it, at least in my book. But don’t… the point is, you have enough to feel bad about without adding extra charges to your tab. There’s no reason to give yourself a hard time over things you aren’t at fault for. Not to say that I don’t appreciate the apology. Especially that it was a genuine one, not a “I hurt you but you hurt me too so we’re even,” or a “I’m sorry you’re hurt but I was right,” or a “I’m only apologizing to be the bigger person and make you feel shitty,” or anything like that. But you… I-- Just… How about we save the apologies for when you actually fuck up?”

Alice grinned timidly. “I think we can manage that.”

Quentin returned her smile, then made to get up, but Alice stopped him with a hand on his wrist. “Can I ask you something?” she asked.

He nodded.

“Are you and Eliot… like, a thing now?”

“I-- we talked about it but neither of us are really… I mean, it’s been shit, you know? Jumping into a ‘thing’ would probably just hurt us.”

Alice bobbed her head in understanding. “I’m… I’m glad. Not that you’re in a bad place, or that you aren’t together or whatever… just… I’m glad you’re thinking things through. Our relationship was a garbage one, maybe because we didn’t do that. Maybe if we had… if we’d been more honest, more emotionally mature… maybe we could have worked. I’m happy it won’t go that way with Eliot. You… You deserve a good, healthy relationship. You both do.” 

She stood and turned to go, and he stood too. “Alice,” he called, and she turned back to face him, halfway to the door. “You deserve one too. Fuck, do you deserve one.”

She smiled, and in an instant she was back in front of him, wrapping him in a hug, one he eagerly returned. 

Their relationship may have been shit, but he still loved her. God did he love her. He was glad that now, he had a chance to do it as he was meant to. Like a friend.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Again. I'm sorry for how short it was. I wanted to give Alice the spotlight because A) I realized I hadn't at all yet and B) she deserves some closure. They did Alice and the Qualice relationship so dirty in the show, and they both deserve the opportunity to understand their relationship wasn't healthy and that they need to move on and just be friends.
> 
> I wish I'd had this up sooner. I'm sorry I didn't. My mind has been in Firefly world, and I realized how little Kaylee centric fanfic there was and I needed to fix it. I just want a non-shippy Kaylee fic. Is that too much to ask? 
> 
> I really hope you enjoyed! I have the next and LAST chapter started, and I hope to have it up by next week. 
> 
> Please please please leave a comment. Let me know what you thought! I thrive off of comments!!


	10. Hope

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Eliot comes home.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Well well well, here it is, the end of the road. Enjoy this final chapter!

Eliot was released from the hospital on a morning that dawned bright and sunny and then quickly turned overcast and chilly, three weeks after first being admitted. Quentin and Margo were there to take him back to the Cottage, a place no one had been with him when the Monster was running his body. Julia, Alice, and Penny still hadn’t quite been able to visit him without being tense the whole time, and no one thought Kady was quite comfortable either, despite not showing signs of obvious discomfort. They had a tough time looking at him without seeing the Monster, and who could blame them?

He exited the infirmary under his own power, using a cane that Quentin thought bore a resemblance to the one he’d used as an old man in Fillory, and though Eliot denied it being intentional, Quentin hadn’t quite missed the way he’d traced the curves of the handle nostalgically upon receiving it. 

It struck Quentin in an odd sort of way, the fact that so many of them thought of Eliot’s possession when they looked at the man, while all he could think of was their time at the mosaic. He was thinking about it more and more, now that there was no huge quest occupying their time. Maybe the lack of something to occupy his time combined with his newest depressive episode had him nostalgic for happier times. Simpler times. When he and Eliot could be completely emotionally available for each other and they didn’t have to actively worry about the end of the world without feeling bad for abandoning it because honestly, it’s not like they were. 

But it was nice, though, to look at Eliot and see something happy, not one of the worst times of his life. 

It wasn’t like things were even close to perfect. Therapy was a bitch, for example, something Quentin knew he had to go to so he could feel better, but didn’t actually want to attend for much of the time. It took a lot of energy he didn’t always have, and it was something he couldn’t even really avoid if he ever wanted to  _ stop _ not having the energy to do things. Medication only helped so much. Oh, yeah, he was taking medication again too, which he’d never loved doing, and now disliked even more because of the way it made him feel like he was intentionally trying to be a worse magician or something, which was bullshit, because it was something that could actually make him feel better. 

And magic itself was still wonky. Everett dying in the mirror realm had sent so much of it flooding back into the world at once, and so they were experiencing surges that were unpredictable at best, and more often than not, dangerous. Josh had gone back to Fillory to update Fen, only to find that the timelines were so out of synch, Fillory was now 300 years in the future, under rule of someone who actually called himself the Dark King, like that was a name that would inspire any amount of faith in his rulership. 

And all of them still had shit to work out. It wasn’t like it was just Quentin and Eliot who had things going badly over the last few months, and now that there wasn’t any active danger anymore, they were all trying to sort things out as best they could. Penny was trying to make amends with Julia, who was trying to cope with her loss of magic and make amends with Quentin at the same time. Margo and Josh were taking the loss of Fen very hard, and Quentin felt like that would probably be their next big hurdle to tackle. Alice had suddenly found herself at the helm of a still reeling Library, and working with Zelda was proving a difficult thing to accomplish. And now, Kady was trying to keep a massive network of hedges from collapsing underneath its own strain, and organize a system that had been running on chaos for the longest time. 

But despite all of the shit, Quentin still couldn’t help but feel… good. Better. Like there was a light at the end of the tunnel, and after feeling like there wasn’t one for so long, it was like a huge weight had been lifted from him. 

That evening, Josh and Eliot collaborated to make a nice sit down dinner for their group. Collaborating, of course, in this instance, meant Josh did all the cooking and Eliot sat in a chair in the kitchen, ordering Margo around and licking spoons clean, but he did manage to toss a very lovely salad, and so they collectively agreed to give him full marks for effort. 

It was a remarkably sober affair. Quentin’s antidepressants and Eliot’s pain medication both came with strict rules about alcohol, namely, that they couldn’t have any. Julia convinced everyone to go without to show solidarity, and so wine and champagne went unpopped, and instead, Margo and Eliot came up with a tableau of mocktails for them to enjoy. Kady wryly announced that it was probably the first dry party in decades to be hosted at the cottage, and shockingly, they all found they had a rather nice time despite that. 

They made a bonfire out back after dinner. They drank tea and hot cocoa and roasted marshmallows and laughed, and Quentin sat, nestled comfortably between Eliot and Alice, and felt truly light in a way he hadn’t in months. 

As the party unwound and the group fell into a comfortable silence, Kady started humming a tune under her breath, and Eliot started singing along when he recognized it. Soon enough, the entire group had begun a slow, sweet rendition of  _ Take on Me _ . It shook Quentin with a strange, sad sensation of deja vu, like he’d been there before, only without having been a part of it, and he squeezed Eliot’s hand tightly to ground himself. 

He was there, he was alive, and he was getting better, he reminded himself.  _ Here, alive, better. Here, alive, better. Here, alive, better.  _

After running on empty for so long, it was nice to finally be able to run on hope. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I can't lie, I'm enormously relieved to be bringing this story to an end. It was tough to get the last few chapters out with so many new ideas running through my mind, especially after realizing I'd started something I wasn't quite sure how to end, so I'm glad I managed it, and am relatively satisfied with where I'm ending off. 
> 
> I want to thank you all so much for reading this, and I want to thank all those who commented for giving me any sort of strength to end off. You were the only reason I didn't drop the story when the going got tough, and your words of encouragement have meant the world to me. I know this isn't even close to the only story of it's kind, so thank you for giving this one a chance. 
> 
> Did you enjoy? Please let me know. Leave a comment down below!
> 
> Thanks again, lovely readers. Good night.

**Author's Note:**

> SO here we are. Hoping y'all enjoy this. I don't know how frequently I'll update, but I'll try to as often as possible. Here's hoping this doesn't get too long. I'm planning for like... 5 chapters? but I don't know what'll happen. We'll see. 
> 
> Please leave a review and let me know if you're interested in this! I'm like tinkerbell. I need validation to live.


End file.
